Interview with Ben Krakauer of Old School Freight Train
Banjo Newsletter, published June 2006

Old Schools Freight Train’s new CD Run offers insight into the colorful future of string band music. Released on David Grisman’s Acoustic Disc label, the music covers the gamut of newgrass, swing, pop tunes, and beyond. 24 year-old Ben Krakauer holds his own as Old School Freight Train’s banjo player. His offerings include remarkable compositions, progressive techniques, and a creative view of the banjo’s role in a string band. Ben’s playing is striking in his breadth of tone. He can offer a wonderfully bright traditional bluegrass sound, and then seam it into a spiraling bebop line. Ben’s compositional skills displayed on Run are superlative, as he penned “Lookee Here,” an adventurous tour of modern acoustic music, and the Latin-flavored “Tango Chutney,” with a brilliant melody and captivating arrangement. After recording Run, David Grisman toured with Old School Freight Train as his back-up band, playing shows consisting of all Dawg music. Additionally, Ben and band mate Pete Frostic (mandolin player) recorded a duo album called Wide Open, a unique effort that travels around the world in its compositional styles, yet maintains an engaging characteristic throughout. Ben and I had the fortunate opportunity to sit down at last summer’s Four Corner’s Folk Festival in Pagosa Springs, Colorado and discuss all things banjo.

Tell me about Old School Freight Train.

In college I played with some people around Charlottesville, and after our first year of school Pete Frostic (Old School Freight Train’s mandolin player), Jesse Harper (guitar) and I decided to form a band. When Pete and I first got together we would have certain bands that we tried to base our sound off of. We were going for interesting arrangements like the David Grisman Quintet, the Kruger Brothers, and the Lonesome River Band. Darrell Muller (bass) and Jesse Harper (guitar) were really into jazz and other music. We have now been a band for 5 years, yet it took a while to develop a unified sound.

Old School Freight Train pulls off some amazing stuff, like Indian music and Charlie Parker tunes, yet you give these styles a genuine feel while maintaining the fact that you are a string band.

I think it started as a sacrifice. If you get together a bunch of bluegrass guys and you can jam for 5 hours and not repeat tunes. But with this band it was much harder to play together at first. Our first gig was an hour set, and we had played all our material we could come up with in 30 minutes. Because we were from such different backgrounds, we did not have excess material, only the material we arranged. So it was a sacrifice in the beginning, but it has paid off now because now we have pushed each other to learn other material, and we can draw from all sorts of sources.

How did you hook up with David Grisman?

We recorded a demo CD and our manager sent it to Acoustic Disc. It made its way to Grisman and he liked it. So it quickly became something, and he called and said, “What do you want me to do for you guys?” We asked him to produce the album to which he agreed. David enjoys helping out young musicians, and his Quintet was such a big influence on our sound. I am sure he quickly recognized his own influence.

What have you learned from working with Grisman?

He plays with so much force and conviction. It is really impressive. So much of his music sounds so subtle and even delicate. But when playing with him in a room, I learned he is playing incredibly loud, yet with great tone all the time. Every single phrase is just right on. He never plays something that he doesn’t know what it is going to sound like. I think that is a sign of musical mastery, if you know exactly what you are going to play, and play it with the utmost conviction. He knows that it is going to be the sound he wants. He also got us to record live to analog in his studio. I think that process was great for us. It felt like, “If you guys think you can play and do this thing, then why not do it live.” It had almost an old school attitude about it. But I liked it and found it inspiring. We did not know we were going to record it live till we got to California. We had discussed it as an option but we thought we could use ProTools if we wanted to. When we arrived it was set to record direct to 2-track. They mixed it live, like all the other great Acoustic Disc material.

Old School Freight Train toured with David Grisman last summer. What were those sets like?

He told us we could play whatever we wanted to as long as he wrote it. So we picked out our favorite tunes, and when we met up he suggested a few others. Even at the Grand Targhee Bluegrass Festival before the show he showed us a new tune “Blues for Vassar.” We played a lot of his standard repertoire like “EMD,” but we also played “Dawg Patch,” “Barkley’s Bug,” “Little Samba,” and “Pneumonia;” a lot of different stuff that his Quintet doesn’t always play. He is a great guy and very laid back. We did a bunch of shows together this summer, but hopefully we will do more in the future. Old School Freight Train opened up, and then the second set we were Grisman’s band. But some other shows the Quintet played too. Playing the encore with them was always amazing. Getting the opportunity to play with him, and also with Joe Craven, Darol Anger, Mike Marshall, and Andy Statman, has been so incredible. These guys have that higher plane of mastery, and being around them is really inspiring.

On stage you spend a lot of time not physically playing your instrument during songs. I think that’s fantastic, and many banjo players could stand to do more of that. What is your thought process around it?

Part of it is a tonal thing. The banjo has such a strong timbre that it can potentially overpower the mix if you are playing all the time during delicate sections. Likewise if you lay out, it has much more force when you come back in. I think it comes from listening to a lot of different genres of music. I don’t listen to a lot of pop music, but I listen to some and it is all so arranged. Instruments come in and out, and maybe all of a sudden a huge string section will come in. It can be quite compelling. I have some classes on Indian music and Indian film music. The arrangements are incredible. Some instruments will come in for 30 seconds and then disappear. And then another sound comes in. In jazz, a trumpet player will play the head, play their solo, maybe play some guide tones, but otherwise they lay out. And I think that is very interesting, and very cool.

Have you studied a lot of Indian music?

I took a college class on North Indian classical music. I took one semester on Bollywood music and some other classes on Indian film. The Bollywood film genre is quite cheesy, with some of the worst movies I have ever seen. But that is part of the fun. I don’t find many of the movies very enjoyable, but the music sequences are incredible. In the class, we did watch some really great non-Bollywood films by director Satyajit Ray. Ravi Shankar wrote a lot of soundtracks for some of his movies, and they are fantastic scores. I wrote a tune called “The Dragon” in 5/4, which Pete Frostic and I recorded on “Wide Open.” Those Shankar soundtracks inspired it. With film, even Western film, the images give you a strong emotional association with the music. Where as sometimes being a musician, I will often intellectualize music when just listening to it. I’ll think, “ What is this guy doing? What devices is he using? Maybe I’ll learn that.” But when you watch a move you are thinking about the drama, and not thinking about it technically; it has a different effect on you. When you go home and play afterwards, and without trying to recall the specifics of the music you have this subtle connection to it in a different way. Otherwise, for me, I tend to think too much about my hands.

With your right hand, are you playing with 4-fingers now?

I wear the fourth pick all the time, and am using it more and more. I am not really rolling, but I am chording with all four. And I am trying to get in the habit of working the ring and middle fingers together. I have only been doing it for a couple of months, but I want to get into it more. I met Greg Liszt (4-finger banjo player with the band Crooked Still) about 6 years ago and heard him play all sorts of stuff, but didn’t want to get into it at that point. But after a while when trying to voice jazz chords, that was the turning point. My friend Adam Larrabee who teaches jazz guitar at New England Conservatory of Music has studied banjo for about 4 years, and plays with 4 fingers. He plays jazz on the banjo like no one else. He showed me this arrangement of John Coltrane’s “Giant Steps” on the banjo using 4-note chords and pinches earlier this summer and that was my turning point. Hearing jazz music played very well on the banjo is a real interest of mine.

Can you tell me about your record Wide Open?

Pete and I have been playing together for many years, and we have an easy musical chemistry when we jam together. We had already recorded an Old School Freight Train disc in 2001, and were planning to record a second. We were still working on the music, and things weren’t happening. Pete and I decided to try and write some new-age music for banjo and mandolin, and record a duo album. Most of the material we came up with in about a month, but some we had before. We didn’t do it live, but most everything is first, second, or third take, with a few studio tricks. It was very improvisational. We weren’t trying to be perfectionists about it, just trying to play with a lot of energy, and get the sprit of the two of us playing together.

How did you get started playing banjo, what is your main banjo, and do you plug in onstage?

At 15 I was not really satisfied with playing video games and wanted something more. My parents had 2 recordings with banjo when I was growing up, and I like the exotic sound of it. It intrigued me. I play a 1999 Gibson RB-250 with a Tony Pass rim, and Kyle Smith does my set-up, whenever I get a get the chance to send it to him. I used to plug in always, but since doing shows with David Grisman, the pickup sound was not really working with his sound. We went back to microphones for the shows with him. It was as total wakeup call for the band. Even though you can’t be as loud, we all felt it sounded so much better to not use pickups. So since this last summer, we have been playing into mikes.

Tell me about your music degree. What do you draw on from those classes that you continue to use on stage today?

I got a BA in music from the University of Virginia. I took classes on theory, on 19th and 20th century classical music, as well as ethnomusicology. But the main thing as far as playing was taking jazz lessons from a great trumpet player named John D’earth. Even though I was playing banjo, he would sit down with me at the piano and with his trumpet and teach. While studying with John I would regularly go see his Thursday night gig, and saw him play with some amazing musicians. Taking those lessons and being able to see him play with an amazing band was inspirational highly inspirational. Some of the values and ideas involved in jazz music entail using space, not playing your instrument, and also using lots of variations. This has stuck with me. Additionally, trying to not always using the same kind of tone and varying my rhythmic patterns. In bluegrass related music, people tend to play streams of 8th notes, and syncopate those melody notes in interesting ways. That is a very cool thing, but in jazz many musicians use shorter phrases separated by space, and the phrases are often angular and discontinuous

Was school filled with lots of scale studies?

My freshman year was spent playing a massive amount of scales. I had played a lot of bluegrass, but never even learned the major scales. I tried to take a jazz class early, but quickly learned that I needed to do a lot of shedding to grasp all the scales and chords. I continue to work on these, because there is so much stuff like half-whole diminished, and other altered scales.

How do you warm up?

Before a show I try not to play too much because I want to have a fresh flow of ideas, maybe in a perfect world I would have time to do a routine to get my hands warmed up, and get my mind in gear, but as it is I try not to play too much. One thing I do is practice backwards rolls, and try to give myself some challenging chords to go through with those rolls. I am engaging my mind to process this harmony thing, while playing a repetitive same right hand pattern very slowly. For example Adam Larrabee said to me the other day, “ Whenever you have a chord, think of that chord as being based on the diatonic chord a third up.” That means if you are on a Gmajor7 chord, instead of thinking of it as a Gmajor7, think of it as a Bminor7. So today for G, I was rolling through B, D and F#, then D, F#, an A, then A, B, and D. These are all the triads of Bminor7, yet thinking of those as G. At home I have been obsessively practicing old-time fiddle and not focusing on banjo practice, but I go in cycles with my banjo practice. I tend to start with a very slow backwards roll to get the tendons warmed up. Then I typically use the metronome and set it to 50 and practice scales slowly, but not ones that I already know. I work on things that I feel I have down at about 70%. Or maybe something new, and try to engage my mind, and play slow enough because it is really good for your hands and also the speed of thought. When practicing fast you are not going to build your mental mastery of the music, yet you will get great chops practicing fast. I find that jamming with people will get my chops up to speed.

Do you use a computer to practice?

All I use it for is primarily transcribing. I use the Amazing Slow Downer program, and I used it for a lot of those Grisman melodies.

How are your notation reading skills?

I consider that a weakness in my playing. If someone wants to work on a jazz tune, even at a slow tempo I have a hard time reading through it in time. It is something I want to work on. In school I worked through many things in all 12 keys, and worked around the circle of fifths. When I got to C# and F#, I’d think in terms of Db and Gb, but I think for jazz it is really important to be able to play in C# and Db, even though the notes are the same. If I am reading off the page, it often slows me down with all the sharps. This is also something I need to work on.

Your band joked on stage about not always being well received with audiences by being something different. Does that happen very often?

I think it was more of a problem when we were trying to play a lot of bluegrass. Early on I was really into Sammy Shelor, Ron Block and Ron Stewart, while that is still some of my favorite banjo music, I've come to realize that my sound is not going to be the same sound as those guys. When we played bluegrass like that some audience members would get drawn in, but then get turned off when we tried some of our other stuff. There was a period where we tried to put 2 or 3 bluegrass tunes in per set to draw people in, but now we just play the material from out records, and if we feel like it we will put in a bluegrass tune. But we don’t do bluegrass in every set and it has freed us up, and our audience too. The fact that David Grisman produced our CD lets people know right up front that we don’t play traditional music even though the name “Old School Freight Train” might have a traditional ring.

Anything else you want to tell BNL readers?

One thing that has been a very positive influence in the last year and a half is that I have started to go to a great Tae Kwon Do school in Charlottesville. It is a lot like music in its elegance of the form, and attention to getting all the details, yet it has this great physical component. I think it is critical for musicians to have a day-to-day balance and routine. Usually it is either drugs and alcohol, or some sort of exercise. I have really been enjoying Tae Kwon Do and the relationship to music. Also in regards to what the band does and how some people consider it to be far out for the banjo, my introduction to the banjo was that it was an exotic instrument. Everyone played guitar and I picked something more exotic and different. For me, that is totally contiguous with having interests in jazz and Indian music. I don't see it as taking a different angle, it is just finding interesting sounds, and exploring those styles of music

What is in your CD player right now?

Since I am on this old-time fiddle kick, I am listening to Bruce Molsky’s Poor Man’s Troubles and Contented Must Be. I was just at Clifftop Fiddler’s Convention and picked those up, as well as Tommy Jarrell and Brittany Haas. On my iPod, I have been checking out this Billy Contreras and Christian Howe's duo jazz violin record.

Old School Freight Train is on the web at www.osft.net